168 The Descent of Man. 



now automatic and mechanical Avere originated in sensation. 

 Without sensation the animal kingdom could scarcely have 

 existed except perhaps in its lowest forms. The perception 

 of temperature is necessary to prevent destruction by freez- 

 ing or burning. The senses of hunger and of propagation 

 it is easy to perceive are necessary to the existence and per- 

 sistence of animals as they are now organized. Sensation 

 is also necessary to education. It is not the method of 

 nature to produce intelligence out of unconscious bodies, 

 but the reverse is the process; viz., that liabits of animals, 

 both conscious and unconscious, are the product of education 

 during conscious states. 



When we enter the realm of consciousness we are in a 

 universe which is in some respects not subject to the scales 

 and the measure of the materialist. No doubt every act of 

 consciousness requires for its performance the expenditure 

 of energy, but there are some of the functions of mind 

 which are not correlated with the amount of energy expended 

 in producing them, so far as relates to their mental quality. 

 Of all mental acts this is especially true of the formation 

 of a judgment as the result of a consideration of induce- 

 ments, or reasons, or the mutual pressure of motives, 

 No matter whether the judgment be free or not, the con- 

 sideration of, the estimation of, and surrender to, reasons, 

 is a process outside the pale of the scales of the physicist 

 or physiologist. This is the most important fact known to 

 man. Its shows that although his mind is bound to its 

 material basis, it controls that basis, within limits, by purely 

 mental processes, Avhich are jwr se entirely free from the 

 trammels of matter, although they may not be free from 

 the laws of mental action. 



Every time an animal performs a designed act for the 

 first time, he makes a judgment. In other words every time 

 an animal does anything for a reason, or as a choice between 

 alternatives, he performs an act of judgment, until he has 

 learned to do it so readily that the act has become automatic, 

 or has become, in other words, instinctive. Thus every 

 time such an act is performed there takes place an interfer- 

 ence with the uniformity of action of the law of the conserva- 

 tion @f energy ; because a not weighable or measurable di- 

 rection of energy takes place, i. e. in the movement of an 

 aairaal's body. 



The progress of organic evolution has finally result- 



